FakeBen says: "Will we take our own advice and let bad companies fail?"

The U.S. is doing most of what it told Asia not to. It counseled higher interest rates, stronger currencies, fiscal belt-tightening, avoiding fresh asset bubbles and limits on bailing out investors. These days, the U.S. is reminding the world it's better at giving economic advice than taking it...

"A lot of the features are similar between the U.S.'s problems and the Asian crisis,'' Kim says. "In Asia we had reckless lending, reckless investment and excess liquidity spilling over into the economy, bailouts and moral hazard risks. This time we see those same factors in the subprime crisis..."

After Korea received a $57 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund there was no time to waste. Weak companies and commercial banks were allowed to fail. Several merchant banks were closed and their employees were fired.

The steps created considerable uncertainty, yet Korea was the first of the Asian-crisis victims to recover and repay the IMF. While it took Latin America a decade to lure back capital after its meltdown in the 1980s, Korea was regaining investors within 18 months.

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